McGrail Services

On a Friday evening my air conditioning just stop working. On Saturday morning at 6:00 am, I got on Angie's List to search a service provider that would work on Saturday. I finally found Charile McGrail. He only had one member rating, but he was local and I gave him a try. He answered the phone at 7:00 am on the Saturday and said he could be here at 9:30 am. I was so happy. Charlie came, diagnosed the problem and replaced the capacitor. He was professional, fast and the price was very reasonable. I wish I could gave him 10 Stars!

Very Quick and efficient. Was the only provider that would come out same day.

The fact that the helper did all the work is important because I don't know what kind of work the owner does - just what the helper did for me. When I called to make the appointment, he was hesitant to commit to a specific time. He gave me a couple options; I picked the earlier but couldn't make it so he showed up on the second day instead. He was also reluctant to give me a charge for the job. He wanted to work by the hour. His rate was low - less than I would've expected, $70/hr at the time. I told him everything I wanted him to look into. One of the jobs was removing some hard-wired lights in the bedroom. He finally told me what the cost would be for this. I asked about the rest of what I wanted done and he suggested we just went on an hourly rate from there. Without consulting me he turned to his helper and told him to get started. I had to stop him because I couldn't afford everything and wanted to let him know what really needed to be done now. The helper got started on things and Mr. McGrail went to his supplier to get the correct under-cabinet lighting. In the meantime the helper and , went out and picked up the two exterior lights. He got them installed quickly and efficiently. However he had to wait over an hour with me before McGrail showed back up. Then the helper got the under cabinet-lighting installed. It turned out to be several more hours than it could've been. Mr. McGrail said he could prepare the bill at the time or come back. After I got the bill, I saw he ended up charging me not only for the time the helper was doing the electrical work but also the down-time he spent waiting on McGrail to get back and he also charged for the hour he himself was gone. He also charged a one-time $25 "service fee" just for putting me in their computer. I did question the charges somewhat and he went into a long story about how he'd been stiffed on a larger job and that he had to make money somehow. I talked with a neighbor who'd used him as well and she said that there was something "funny" about the bill. A plumber I used said that one of their customers said the same thing about him - that it was difficult to figure his bill. It's just doesn't seem like good business practice and regardless of the quality of work, I won't use him again.